Matt Gambino Speaking & Training

One thing

Your audience has already forgotten most of your presentation. Sorry about that.

I’ve been trolling a number of sales and presentation groups on LinkedIn lately, and I’m intrigued by all the claims about “audience retention” and presenters using “scientific methods to get people to recall information.”

It’s likely that Doogie Howser and Stephen Hawking were able to recall all the data spewed at them in their 50-minute college lectures. I—on the other hand—could not. So I studied. Most of the time.

I know I’m going to get belted in the mouth for saying so, but I’m of the mind that you’re wasting your time by trying to get your audience to remember everything you tell them. Instead, consider shooting to make just one thing stick. Sure, that one thing could be a bit of information to recall. (Politicians use this method all the time, when they make those snappy catchphrases you just know they’re praying will make it on the CNN or the FOX News ticker.)

That one thing might also be a feeling. Or even a next step to take.

What’s the one thing, you want each person to recall, feel, or do? Think about it from the audience member’s point of view and write it down in magic marker. This is your goal, and it deserves a place on an otherwise blank sheet of paper.

For example…

• I’m headed to their booth.
• Our office will upgrade to the new version.
• I want to see a demo.
• I want that guy to do a keynote at our sales meeting.
• I’m signing up to be a beta tester.
• Those were the coolest slides at the conference.
• I’m going to buy that book.
• There were 150 of us in there, but I swear she was talking to me.
• I’ll pitch this to my customer next week.
• He was prepared.
• The time flew by.
• I didn’t want it to end.